Submission to A Wife Abuser?

October is the Domestic Violence Awareness Month. I avoided the topic for 15 days. I knew that talking about it would stir up too many emotions inside. But tonight, after watching John Piper's YouTube video, I can no longer stay silent. 

“If the numbers we see in domestic violence were applied to terrorism or gang violence, the entire country would be up inarms, and it would be the lead story on the news every night.” --- Rep. Mark Green

Now do see the number here: Domestic Violence Resource Center
or a simple fact sheet here: National Coaliltion Against Domestic Violence

Then watch this video from John Piper:
John Piper: Does A Woman Submit to Abuse?


Is this how a Christian ought to respond to an extremely painful question? A situation that has been tearing apart our families? That has destroyed countless women and children? That God deeply despises?


In fact, my conclusion is that John Piper did not answer the question at all. Using a classic way to avoid answering a direct and pointed question, he directed attention to other things (such as "group sex"). He also reduced a behavior that ripps apart a person's soul to "a season" and "smack you around one night". 

Normal men do not get up one morning or come home one night and start smacking their wives around.  The issues go a lot deeper than the surface behaviors. Abuse doesn't stop at smacking someone around one night either, it usually escalates if not stopped. This past Wednesday (10/12), a man shot 8 people and critically injured 9 others at a Seal Beach salon.  He killed his ex-wife.

A man who responded to John Piper's advice for abused woman to go to church for help was: "I am going to a church and the pastor of the church beats his wife, I don't know if he hits his children, too...."  John Piper obviously was ignorant to all the facts about violence against women within the church, in the name of God and under the umbrella of "submission". When a man has absolute authority over another human being (man or woman alike), it simply breeds abuse.

Allow me to share with you just two of the (too) many true stories that I have witnessed first hand.
She was a pilot, single, successful and a devoted Christian (she was from a famous megachurch. If I shared the name with you, you all would know the church).  She met this wonderful Christian man and got married.  Not long after the wedding, he started smacking her around.  Then it gradually became an everyday event.  One night she left the porch light on for him since he was coming home late.  He beat her because she was wasting money. The next day, she kept the porch light off as he instructed.  He came home and beat her because the porch light was not on and he could not see his key.

She went to her church for help (as John Piper suggested) and the church leaders consulted her to be patient, to be more respectful of her husband, to be even more submissive. So she did. The husband cried and repented in front of the leaders of the church (most abuser are also master manipulators).....and the abuse went on. Due to the abuse, she could no longer work as a pilot since her husband once punched her face so hard, she lost her sight in one of her eyes. But as a submissive Christian wife, she hung on.

They had a child, a beautiful daughter. One day in his rage (for the child was crying as most infant would do), he threw the baby over the crib.  The baby is now deaf in one ear.  This woman finally woke up, filed a police report and a restraining order.  The police took him out of the house and she filed for divorce.  Because she filed for divorce, the church no longer accepted her.  Then the former husband came back to the house on and off, broke in and terrorized her .  When I met her, she had security cameras on all sides of her house....and she lived in fear and the betrayal not just from her husband, but also from her church.

Another true story: I was having dinner with her and her husband...and something went wrong. She did not take the seeds out of the cucumber she made and he did not like his cucumber with seeds. It was really my fault, I suggested that seeds are good for the digestive system. He stormed out of the apartment. Later he started throwing stuff at the windows from outside, yelling and cursing at us. I was terrified. But my heart broke into pieces when I turned around and saw my friend (who is an intelligent woman, with a Master degree, extremely gifted and valued at her work........a young Christian I led to Christ) lying on the ground behind the sofa, curled into a fetal position, sobbing and shaking like a leaf in the winter wind. It dawned on me that this was not the first time. I crawled on the ground (to avoid being hit by the debris from the windows) to the phone and called for help. 

She was the first woman that I helped escaping from an abusive man.  Unfortunately, she was not the last.

I wonder how John Piper would feel if he was smacked around for no reason at all?....for just one night? For several weeks? Several months? How about for a season, however long that is?  I wonder how would he feel?

John Piper is certainly a great apologist and writer, but he is woefully ignorant about an issue that has plagued the society and our churches for centuries. 

John Piper is also a man of great influence.............for good or for bad. 

May the Lord have mercy on us all!